>> next on booktv, brad meltzer talks about the research he did for his latest novel, "the fifth assassin," including his examination of the four people who have successfully assassinated u.s. presidents. it's about 40 minutes. >> so a couple, let me count it, one, two, three, four, five -- fourteen days ago in new york city we broke the guinness world record. we were trying to break the guinness world record for most secret decoder rings used in one place. that is the nerdest thing you can do with your -- nerdiest thing you can do with your time ever. we broke the record, it was great. nothing was nerdier except being in a bookstore on a friday night, people, okay? [laughter] so just, i pity all of us really, all of us. um, i want to say the most important thing of all. it will be, i promise, the most

important thing i will say tonight, and that is thank you. everything i say after that will be straight downhill, and i'll tell you, i'll save some of the specific thank yous for the end. what we're here to talk about is "the fifth assassin," and people always say where do you get your ideas for books? i'll tell you about this store. because of dakota, no one gets crazier mail than me. like, the last time i was at this store for the inner circle, someone brought me the holy grail, okay? is that guy here? is the guy -- i have to ask first. he's not here? then let's talk about him, okay? [laughter] here's what happens. i'm not joking you, i promise you this is true. i was standing over there, and he comes up to early, and he's like, brad, and i'm like, yeah, and he says do you want to see the holy grail? and he has the crazy eyes, and i'm like you brought the holy grail all the way to barnes & noble, how do i not say yes?

in that aisle over there he takes out the holy grail, i mean, the holy grail. goes into his knapsack, pulls out the holy grail, and he says to me, do you read hebrew? and i'm like, i do. and he says, then you'll understand what this says. i take the holy grail, and i look at it real close, and i'm eyeing this old, ancient pot that might have been born at pottery barn -- i can't even speak tonight -- i'm looking at thing, and he says you see now, right? and i'm looking real close, and there's not a single hebrew letter on this entire thing. there's not any letters. like if you took the head of a pin and just went dot, dot, dot, that's all that's on there. and he say, you understand now, don't you? i say, i understand completely. and i'm walking backwards, security, right here. considering last time i'm here i got the holy grail, i am a little disappointed that no one brought me the fountain of youth. oh, you have it? sometimes the good news is you

get an amazing letter from someone, and a longtime reader of mine said, brad, i work at a museum in washington, d.c. that almost nobody knows about, and you have so see what our collection has here. and i'm like, listen, i'm really busy with the holy grail, so tell me what you've got. and he said to me we've got pieces of abraham lincoln's skull, the skeleton of john wilkes booth and we've got the bullet that killed lincoln. they don't just have the artifacts, but they have pieces of some of the other ones as well. and when i'm there, you know, he opens up a drawer, and in the drawer are a bunch of bones. all these bones. almost like you took a skeleton from your biology class and dumped them in a drawer, and i see a femur and other bones i can't remember the name because i only know femur. when i did that joke in florida, my uncle, who's a doctor, was

like, there's an ulna. i'm like, freaking relatives. [laughter] i opened the drawer, and he goes meet president garfield. then he opens up another drawer and takes out this spongy jar. any man that will give you a brain, right? invite him to your party. he's awesome, right? he gives out brains. and then his assistant opens up another drawer and takes out a leather kind of like a swatch of leather. when you go pie your sofa -- buy your sofa, they give you a little swatch, and i see there's writing on the letter, and i say what's the writing on this? she says to me, oh, that's the tattoo. i'm like, the tattoo? i realize what i'm holding is not just someone's leather, it's someone's skin. anyone who gives you a brain and skin, invite them to your party, right? they're awesome. this museum is the national museum of health and medicine,

and what they have there, it used to be an army research facility. and what they used to do is if you were shot in the civil war and you died, and you got shot in the arm and you died, they would awe off your arm and send -- saw off your arm and send it to the research place and say figure out why you died. they couldn't figure it out. so they kept sawing off body parts parts and sent it off to this museum. they realized at germ therapy develops the reason you're dying is because of infections, blood poisoning. and when they figured that out, they now realize, they say, wait, we're going to turn this research facility into a museum. and he said to me that the smithsonian has dorothy's ruby red slippers, we got all the body parts. and that's a party, right? and they have, what happened was when lincoln was shot and they did the autopsy and they took his brain out, the bullet fell from his brain, clinked into the sink, and that's how they found it. when the assassins were killed,

people love the assassins in an odd, creepy way. they were almost like saints, they wanted pieces of them. so they used to cut the lining of the coffins to get pieces of that, their hair, their clothes, anything they could to own a piece of this assassin. and that's what this museum is, that's what it holds. and when i was there, as he handed -- audiotape, i lost this thing. we're back. as he hands me this piece of skin, i see also on the corner a red diamond. and the red die london like you see on a playing card. and we all see playing cards all the time, right? we've seen them our whole lives. this is how my brain works. is every detail when abraham lincoln was shot, almost everything is cataloged and known. they can tell you what john wilkes booth had in his pants pocket, what the contents of his wallet were, what the name of his horse were and the color. they'll tell you next to ford's theater there was a bar, and john wilkes booth before he shot abraham lincoln went into this bar and ordered a drink.

they'll tell you exactly what kind of drink he orders. the only detail that is not known has to do with how john wilkes booth got the white house valet. john wilkes booth walks into ford theater, he runs into an employee of the white house. and here's the moment in history, all this guy has to do is stop john wilkes booth, and all of history changes. at that moment rather than stopping him, john wilkes booth hands this valet a card, and to this day the only detail that is not known about the lincoln assassination is what is on this mysterious card. and some people say it's a calling card, and some people say it's a business card. i remembered that, actually, business cards back then used to be playing cards. playing cards used to be blank on one side, you used to write your name on the other side to identify yourself. at the university of pennsylvania you could use them to get into class, that was your id was a playing card that was blank on one side. so my brain goes like this: you

have a playing card that i can link now to john wilkes booth, and now i have a playing card that i can potentially link to the second assassin, charles giew toe, and now i have a thread. and i can weave that thread and pull it assassin to assassin. and, obviously, this is where the fiction takes over, but i start thinking about playing cards. hearts and diamonds and clubs and spades, we all know them. but they're symbols, and they mean something. they're not just there for decoration. you look at a dollar bill, it has a pyramid with an all-seeing eye on top, right? it's a symbol. they put it there for a reason. it doesn't mean that the free masons are there to eat your babies and kill you, right? but it does mean something. and it's the same with playing cards. and if you want to know what hearts and diamonds and clubs and spades really stand for, you'll see it in the pages -- at least one theory -- in "the fifth assassin." and that's where the book begins where i say what if a serial killer was me meticulously recreating the crimes of all the

assassins? and instead of being four lone wolves, they're all working together for the same secret cause and he wants to be the fifth assassin? so the book begins. for me personally, i become obsessed with assassins. i am like the haled and maude -- harold and maude of dead assan sins. in virginia they're like, i don't get it. you can't make any jokes about jews in virginia. you can make a hanukkah joke, it dies. it's dead. and i have been crazy obsessed with assassins. and what you see, it's interesting, when you talk to the secret service and you ask is them about people who tried to kill the president, there's almost nothing that the assassins have in common, right? they're every age range, old and young, rich and poor, every age range in between. there's no rhyme or reason to it. but if you look at the four who were successful, you start to see the overlap. and, obvious, because it's -- obviously, because it's a smaller group, you see the pattern. and interestingly, all four

assassins who are successfully killed a president is me meticulously neat. they're also barely known as troublemakers until, of course, that instant where they pull the trigger. what's also interesting to me is they were all four men with a cause. and when they -- a couple years ago the government brought together a bunch of futurists, and they wanted to study what's the biggest threat that's going to happen to our national security, what's the biggest threat to america. it used to be, like, russia, the bomb, whatever you want to name it, and what they figured out 10 and 20 years from now the greatest threat will simply be an individual or a small group who's determined to die for their cause, right? and you don't have to invoke 9/11 to see what the damage can be. but when you look at assassins, they can be divided into two categories; hunters and howlers. and howlers make a lot of noise, and they call in bomb threats and say they're going to kill us, but the good news is they rarely take action. hunters are very different. hunters plot, plan and execute. but here's what's fascinating is ha hunter -- that hunters have

almost no interest in howling, and howlers have almost no interest in hunting. and if you look at the four assassins, all four of them are hunters. and that means the secret service, who i have so much respect for, they took me to their training facility out in maryland, it means that the person that they are looking for is the person who they'll never see coming, right? that's a scary thought. um, and along with asags sins -- assassins, you know, the funniest part is, it's always the funniest part, the guy who took me into his museum, the guy who has all the body parts, i saw him in washington, d.c., he was in the front row. i'm like, here's the guy with all the dead body parts, he gave me the brain, i bring him up, i introduce him, everyone claps, i give him a big hug. and he whispers in my ear as i'm hugging him, i don't like hugging very much. [laughter] right? and i'm like that is the most awesome reaction. i want the guy who spends his day with body parts to to hate

hugging. i'm going the buy him an i hate hugging shirt. so i love the fact that he's there, and we get to do that with him. the other part i became obsessed with is, of course, presidents. and the fun part of the research for me is a couple years ago, um, i got a letter from now former president clinton writing about one of the books was someone had -- because someone had sent him one of the books, and then i got one of the craziest, best fan letters from former president george h.w. bush x. he read one of my normals, and he asked -- novels, and he asked if i would sign a copy for him. i'm like, you're the leader of the free world, you get a free book. you're the president. very nice. has me out to houston, i spend some time with the bushes, and barbara and george are like the sweetest, nicest people. they spent the first half hour that we were with them president bush tried to convince my wife that he invented the phase you

the man, right? that's a good joke. and my wife's like, do you know he invented the phrase you the man? i'm like, he did not. although he might have, i don't know, he's the president. but the nice part was as i was researching this book, i got to ask president bush questions about the white house and his time there. and, listen, i write fiction. i can make up anything i want, right? but we all know that there are only a few people on this planet who know what it's like to live in the white house and know that someone out there is trying to to kill you. and that's pretty amazing. so i got to say to him, you know, are you scared, sir, were you scared at that moment? he was, like, not confused by the question, but almost like he'd never heard it before. and he's like, no. that's not the right word. he kept saying, no, no, no. and i asked him to describe it, and he said, you know, we had a lot of tense. tense was easy, right? the white house is always tense. but scared? scared is not there.

and as i thought about it, it made perfect sense to me because it's like that guy who's a construction worker and works on the top of a skyscraper. eventually for that person being that high up all day long the fear of heights disappears. it's no longer part of the job. and we talked about what the assassins have in common. also u.s. presidents have things in common too. and when you're surrounded by that secret service every day and you're getting these reports every day, eventually that has to disappears that fear that you and i would all feel eventually becomes part of the job. and that's a good thing for me. so from obama to bush, that is a good thing. i think that fear does disappear, and i'm not sure i would do much better, but the details you see about the president in this week are base -- in this book are based on my interactions with bush and how e reacted. so when you see the president reacting here, it's obviously much better to be informed by a real person. ..

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>> i called it brad medicaller is's decode. best of all time. what are we having for brad meltzer's dinner. i like to have brad meltzer's pasta. you can sleep on his couch. there you go. my favorite, probably my favorite episode with be the spirit of destiny. that you guys did a while pack. i wonder what your thoughts were. where you think it might lie. he is. >> especially about the spirit of destiny. we did an episode of decoded that was about basically the spear that pierced christ's side when he was up on the crucifix, when he was being crewsfied. the amazing part of the story, all the different leaders throughout history had the spear the they used it to gain power.

that pole i don't know wanted and they all took the thing. the best part the end adolf hitler wanted. i don't believe one second it gives you magic powers but you tell me adolf hitler wants this thing? i want to know what is important about it. that is the fun of the story. we had it on the episode some theories where it was. we had a man who came on the show who contacted me. the reason we did that episode he contacted me years about it. before we even had the show and told me i have a story you need to hear about the spear of destiny. he worked for a very powerful person who kept the company of a u.s. president. basically his boss supposedly had stolen the spear of destiny hitler had. supposedly in a museum why in your and one in museum is supposedly a fake one and real one is took by his boss. some people say it is in a submarine that sunk. some people say the guy has it.

some people say it is in a european museum. i believe that one is fake. the vatican says it is buried below the vatican. the vatican will tell you they have it. what is amazing so many people put so much into the faith of their particular spear. everyone thinks they have the slectded spear. as where i think it is, you know, obviously the vatican says they have it. my guy who came to us says he knows where it is. we tried to track down, one thing we left out of the show, he tell us where he kept it. and we did try to find it. we couldn't verify that part of the we verified all his parts of the story, what he did and that was one part we couldn't. i would obviously want to do that part. we don't want to be reckless and say where it is unless we prove where it is. i'm actually a little disappointed, instead of getting the holy grail you none of you brought me the spear of destiny you think if i knew where it was i would be talking to you, no, i would use the spear of

destiny for my own evil power. i don't know where it is. the vatican insists theirs is the one. our guy says his is the one. a lot of people think it is in a german submarine that went down a long time ago. maybe another episode we could do. other questions, please. get off that easy. this is usually the hard crowd. >> thanks for being here. >> thank you. about decoded where do we stand with a new season and can you talk about any mysteries you like over the show? >> the question, do we get season 3 or not? only in l.a. do they want to know did you get pickup. in virginia, they don't care. they don't know what a pickup is. i hate virginia. so season 3 we don't know yet. we just finished airing the two-hour special on the end of the world. now the best part of that, we aired the two-hour special on the ended world in december that the world is going to end and i

schedule my new novel in january. that is marketing genius. i know how this one ends, this will be okay. we have guy, sweetheart of a guy who build as bunker in wisconsin and take us into the underground bunker, when the pock lips hits he survives. he take us into the bunker -- apocalypse. here is my food and generator and that will keep me alive. here, check it out y'all, 42-inch flat screen. he is so psyched about the 42 inch flat screen and we're dead and burning in flames and apocalypse is on us. don't worry i have a 42-inch much flat screen and costco had a deal we're set. i have a lot of dvd's. i don't need cable. i'm glad you have everything covered. we're all dying. we're waiting to hear on season 3. it begs the question about decoded, for sure one of the next decoded projects will be the next book.

the next book is a decoded book where we'll do count countdown of top ten conspiracies. we'll do pieces on all of them. i love what we're doing with this. the book, after that, who read heroes of my son or heroes for my daughter are a collection histories for my daughter. we did the wright brothers. every time they went out to fly a plane they brought extra material to for mull multiple crashes. they knew they would crash an rebuild, crash and rebuild. i want my son to hear the story, i want my daughter to hear the story. if you have a good order of stubbornness. we did here is my son and heroes of my daughter but we'll do illustrated version for heroes. amelia erhardt, the shirts with the cartoon version. and amelia erhardt and abraham lincoln for children's books to 7 years

old and a sequel to the fifth assassin. my next comic book project i will tell you all about it is, it is those who read tiny titans which is teen titans version, cartoon comic book for little kids. my daughter in the back of every comic book they print artwork by kids that write in artwork. my daughter drew a picture it of wonder girl, one. characters in the book. she said, dad, you think we can get this in the comic? i don't know. and i'm like i called d.c. comics. the fix is on people. get my daughter's stuff in there, please. they put it in. so happy i loved it. drew the most, by the way i know all people think their kids are the best artist. my kid is awesome, draws wonder girl like nobody's business. i love that she draws this amazing little like 7-year-old version of wonder girl. they did as a favor back, can you do a three-page story for us. pick the character that we'll do. and, will you do three

pages. i said i can do it with my 4-year-old, if we write it together. so here's the story that will appear, he picked a polar bear who rides a you any cycle. i don't understand it. go with it. and, i said to him, you tell me what the polar bear will say and i will ride around you. so he says, i said what is the polar bear going to say? we'll fight with light sabres. and my character says, i think we're going to have trademark issues here. we will fight the trademark issues with light sabres. i'm like, i don't think you understand what trademark issues are. basically i say to him, my character i want to get motivation out as 4-year-old. why are we fighting? because we are evil. are you always evil? he says yes. are you evil on your birthday. he says yes? are you evil on groundhog's day? he says yes. are you evil on hanukkah and christmas? and he says, no. end much him is yelling over and over again. chewbacca comes and yoda

comes and trademark issue. that is trademark issue. that is basically the entire story. you will see that coming, i love the fact that we did this. this will be the next comic book work and the fifth assassin sequel. you had a hand up here. >> hello. >> hey, there. >> hi. so, sound like you're really busy and to me. >> is there a -- >> we are. third date. but i was just wondering how do you find time for everything? as a writer, hopeful writer myself how do you find time for family, your books, your comics? >> i appreciate that question. that is actually a very important question. time management is obviously, you can spend your entire life doing work and you can spend your entire life living your life and there's a difference. this is actually the first novel that i wrote sense my parents passed away. if i learned anything, it is

funny when you write a novel there are all things you plan to put in the book and you know you're, who the murderer is going to be, the ending you know those things. there are things you don't even plan on going in there. one of the things that went in here, as i finished the first draft i looked at the book, i was like, what is the book about? i knew there were themes i put on in purpose, but as i fished the first draft i looked down, i got it. beacher is growing up. the main character is growing up. of course he sis. my parents are both gone. that is all i'm doing. i had no choice to make the book about growing up f i learned anything from the love my parents gave me, the love for your family. i try never to work on weekends. obviously i have a speech, i really try never to be working on the weekends. i try never to miss practices. do i always succeed? no. that is the way the priorities lie. why i don't write a book a

year. if i went to write a book a year i wouldn't see my kids as much, i wouldn't see my wife as much and i like them. i hope they like me. but there's a reason why i'm going to be on the red-eye after i leave here, after doing five days of tour because tomorrow is baseball practice. and i plan to be there for it. so i will sleep on a plane. doesn't make me the best dad in the world. i'm struggling like every father out there. for sure that is the most important part of it for me. i absolutely learned that from my own parents. my parents were insane. my mother was insane -- my mom used to say at the dinner table, i would saw my arm off for you. mom, we're eating dinner. what are you talking about? but that love is everything i am. her love for me is my strength and foundation. that is where it comes from. that is the one lesson i have. i'm sorry i can't produce more product but you have to spend time with your family. i appreciate it. thank you. one more question, two more questions? lady in the front.

she has got one. use the mic. this is oprah style. >> so you dropped a hint about the sequel to the fifth assassin. do you want to talk about that? >> well i reveal the ending of "the fifth assassin". no, i can't. but to talk about it, but i always knew this book would not be one book long. i designed beacher's problems to have multibooks. that was the goal without question. i have over and done, here is the tenth justice. you solve the problem, book goes on of the first council, the solve the problem the book goes on. if you did a sequel you were selling out. it was awful thing. sequel was a bad word to me. what i realize sometimes sequels are awful. if you run out of ideas it is awful. the best ones and long form stories are ones that do tell the longer tale. it takes a more complex problem to make it weave over multiple books. i realized i wasn't creating

hard enough problems for my characters in terms of growth that would feed more than one book. the problem was the problem in front of him and, quote, unquote, bad guy. the best bad guy you fight and hardest battle you fight is against yourself always. what you're seeing in beacher in each of these books is the battle he is fighting within himself. that will always be the hardest battle we'll all fight but the most important battle we all fight. we make the same mistakes over and over in our lives until we solve them. that so me is your life's journey. how to figure out and stop making mistakes i at least personally make. so one more hand. >> i just wanted to say that i really enjoyed your youtube video on how to write your own obituary. and also wanted to comment on the proposed new decoded season. and i was hoping that you would possibly touch on stuff like fema cams. >> no. so two points. one, about a youtube video that we put up.

it was actually my ted talk, about writing your own obituary. for those who don't know, i couple years i worked in the same house where superman was created. when a reporter for "the wall street journal" heard about it, he said to me, brad, that will be in your obituary. thank you for clearly contemplating my death, right? it struck me what will be in my obituary? what will be there? what will they say about me? did i matter? was i important? what did i do? did i contribute anything? did i make the world a better place? what will be in my obituary? i was so taken by that i couldn't shake the question. i went back a year later to the reporter. i want to hire you for a job. i want you to write my owe bit airy. he wrote it. that i won't tell you what is in it. if you put in brad meltzer obituary on youtube. you're still asking what will be in your obituary we try to answer it. if you think who will

remember you know how you will be remembered. if you look at the legacy we all leave that is an important question you should ask yourselves. take a little time to look at that. in fema cams, that is one of the top suggestions. amazing to see what people suggest for episodes of "decoded". jfk is number one. people want to know jfk. fema cams. they want to know all the different things over and over. it is interesting, to me when we do the show it is always a mix. not just my ideas of course. it is a true collaboration. we have great producers who i actually seer here tonight. people from "the history channel" who are amazing. it is a true collaboration. we get a good mix of things. ist is not just all things from revolutionary war or all things now but a real mix. that comes over and over. amazing how much it is on people's on the tips of their tongues. i want to tell one last thing and tell a different story. one last question or no? okay. so one final story. a couple months ago, two

months ago to be exact i got to do a uso tour and the uso brought me over to kuwait and two other undisclosed military locations to entertain the troops. when we first went and said you would entertain the troops and move with them and spend time with them and do book signings and book talks i was so honored to be asked. you can't tell anyone where you're going. this is kuwait, undisclosed location. you can't tell anyone. on the tour was all locations we're going. this is the crack security in charge of our lives? are you kidding me? i can't tell you where you went unless i'm wearing that t-shirt. then you will see where we went. obviously honored to go over there. the best part as we got there, the week before our tour of authors, the international thriller writers sends five authors every year and, to go entertain the troops. and we were the third group that got to go over. right before we got there the troops had seen the ultimate fighting champion guys who do cage match

fighting with no shirts on. the dallas cowboy cheerleaders and then us. right? so it was really like the guys with all the muscles, you know the women wearing nothing and the authors who are here to read to you, right? my friend was can you take the audible sigh when you entered the room when they realized they were stuck with you? it was obviously an honor to do it. the reason i got involved with the uso because ten years ago right after 9/11 a guy on submarine, a sailor on a submarine wrote me an e-mail. i'm on a submarine. i can't tell you where i am but on the submarine we don't have a big library but we have your book, the first council. in this time and in this war it is bringing me a lot of peace. i want it say thank you, brad. that is the nicest e-mail i ever got in my life. the guy would take time from where he is on a submarine in the middle of nowhere to thank me. i have to do something nice for the assault lore. i called my publisher saying

can i get 10,000 books donated to the uso? they said thank you. i called another publisher. can i get another 10,000. she said yes. and another, can i get 10,000? they said yeah. we got books donated to the uso. flash forward, later with the uso one. members of the military says to me, brad i want to thank to you all the books donated all those years ago. i said how do you know that? almost nobody knows that? when i was stationed in iraq and afghanistan and they would also say courtesy of the uso so i knew you donated them. don't be thanking me. i'm here to thank you. you're messing it all up. i was struck by the thank you when i came home a month and a half ago i have to track down that soldier, that sailor on that original submarine. i have to find where he is. so i looked at his e-mail

address. his e-mail had changed. i track him down and call him up. listen i don't know if you remember me. my name is brad meltzer, ten years ago you wrote me an e-mail from a submarine. i want to let you know what it started i donated books to the uso and he listens to the whole story. there is odd creepy silence the you know something is wrong. i'm like, something has gone wrong here. did i offend him and i don't know what it is. i say to him, are you okay. it was such an odd silence. he said not really. i said why? a couple days ago my mother died from breast cancer. what he doesn't know my mother had died from breast cancer. at that moment, i stopped and i say to him, i think i'm here to deliver a message to you. and he says, what's the message? and i said, my mom passed away everyone tried to give me advice that wouldn't help, nothing was helpful but this

is the most important thing anyone said to me. they said, our mothers never leave us ever. now he starts crying. because he is crying i'm all tiered up. and, you know as i'm sitting there, thinking i'm not one of those new age people who believe in the magic moment and here is the magic moment. sometimes in life we feel so disconnected and sometimes we are profoundly connected. this guy had taken me like a boomerang and thrown me out, just to come back, arguably on the day he needs me more than any other. i was so struck by that. the reason i tell you the story, is, i want you to think about the power of a thank you. this is all i ask of you. when you leave here and we're done talking and i sign all books and it is all done. think of a person who helped you in your life and you who you owe a thank you too. think about a teacher in high school or junior high or college or anywhere else. think of the person who gave you the first real job. think of a person selling something, you made the first sale to. think of that person and

thank them. i promise you will not ever believe what will come from it. and, the amazing part of the story is, when i told that story last week in washington, d.c., as i got to this point where i said please thank the person you owe are a hand went up in the front row. what do you want to know? he said i have to actually thank you, brad. he said for what? for what you did for me on the submarine ten years ago. it was him. it was the sailor from the submarine came to the signing. of course the whole room is in tears. he comes running up. and i hug him. i tell you in the moment where i hug him, he does not whisper in my ear, i don't like hugging very much. but i do encourage you, the reason i say that at the end. this is the most important thing i will say to you is thank you. thank you for coming here tonight and for supporting me. i want to thank for lisa hosted me in my very first event in los angeles, we had nobody. a couple people and us. took a chance on me from the start. so i love you for that. thank you for doing that. thank you.

[applause] i appreciate it. i have family. i have friend from all walks of life here, from college and high school and other places that come and people who work on "decoded" are here. thank you. i have all the agents here. my manager is here from wme and from lou and anna, david, ari, and who am i --, phil and josh and all these amazing people who let me do what i do and i never get to thank publicly. so thank you for what you do. all the people who come here, like you, there are people who come here every year, including, you know, even scoop is here tonight. without that first help, all those years going to the white house i wouldn't be doing this. so, one last person i want to thank because i never thank him publicly i want to show you what he looks like, scott brick, please come up here. you have to do this. he doesn't know what i'm doing. he is like, oh, crap, now. so when you do your book, one of the things that they do now you do an audio book. the first time i did my

audio book i listened to the tape, and hire ad famous person who will not be named. i listened. didn't sound like me. it sounded stilted or anything. the second book i did hired a woman and it was female lead character. i listened and didn't sound like me and rythyms were off. i heard this voice. >> i don't have anything to read or say. >> that baritone is awesome. so this is actually the guy who does our audio books. he is my voice. [applause] so i never ever, get to thank him. i love you. he just whispered in my ear, i don't like hugging very much. but it sounded baritone and macho. thank you for everyone who came here tonight. i really appreciate it and especially those who come back and watch "decoded" and say i will take a chance on a book. i will be signing books and greatly appreciate it. [applause] >> is there a nonfiction

author or book you would like to see featured on booktv. send us an e-mail or tweet us at twitter.com/booktv >> here are some latest headlines surrounding the publishing industry this past week. mcmillan will pay up to $20 million to settle a pricing suit and consolidated consumer class-action lawsuit. the publisher along with fellow publishing groups, simon & schuster, harpercollins and the penguin work were was accused working with apple to unfairly adjust prices of ebook to compete with amazon. the u.s. justice department conclude the pricing method eliminated competition in the ebook markets. all publishers denied accusations of illegal activity but three went through with the state settlement. harpercollins 19 million and simon & schuster about $17 million. the justice department has concluded its review and approved a merger of

publishers random house and penguin without conditions. the united states is the first country to approve the merger with the review still in progress in europe and canada. the publishers say they expect the merger to be closed later this year. according to the u.s. census bureau book sales for the year 2012 decreased by .5%. that is the smallest decline in years. the bureau reports that book sales were $15.21 billion last year, which is slightly less than the 15.28 billion in sales recorded in 2011. stay up-to-date on breaking news about authors. booings and publishing by liking us on facebook at facebook.com slash booktv or follow us on twitter at booktv. visit our website, booktv.org and click on, news about books,. >> could have wanted more but within the confines of a book you can only do so much. so, we wanted diversity.

we wanted democrats, republicans. we wanted different parts of the country, to some extent we wanted different ages. we new on the basis of nine you can't make generalizations that are 100% certain. and we say as much in the book. we think our conclusions are hypotheses that other people might now run with. in order to make even those kind of hypotheses we needed a fairly diverse group. >> we also included women. you know there is the white house project that's been around for the last couple election cycles and they had eight in '08. so several of the woman that the white house project has identified several years before the 2008 election, olympia snowe, kathleen sebelius, were both in there. and, you know, we wanted to also consider this notion, barbara lee, who had been here several years ago when

you did the last round on madam presidents, six years ago with her foundation talked about looking at women governors. we wanted to look at some of the women governors who had been through barbara lee's training as sort of a pipeline to the presidency. >> we also made the observation that when a male is elected to senatorship, immediately he's cast as a future presidential hopeful. for example, scott brown hadn't even been sworn in yet in massachusetts and the url, scott brown2012.com was already purchased. but so many women had been in washington for so many years as legislators and working on important work and yet their names never bubble to the top and we were curious why not? >> how did you decide that you wanted to write this book? all three of you studied similar topics but how did the book actually come about? >> it was your idea, ted. >> ted.

>> well, i guess it was my idea. i have been a political nerd since i was, i don't know, my parents still remember my sister and i in 1960 staging a nixon-kennedy debate with our stuffed animals. my elephant beat her rabbit. [laughter] and during all of those years of nerd dom, we were always fascinated me were magazine issues that would come out way in advance of a presidential election that would preview, eight or ten or 12 people who ought to be considered and it simply struck me after seeing so many of those issues and so many magazines, that, women were not making it onto that list. they were not being, thought to be presidential. they were, thought for some re